In January, New York City finally began setting crowd pricing, charging drivers a $9 toll to use Manhattan's busiest streets at peak times. The program aims to reduce traffic by discouraging people from entering cities and by using revenue from tolls to invest in improving public transport.
Early data suggests that crowd pricing works as it should, improving commute times and raising nearly $50 million in the first month. But from the start, the program has faced fierce opposition, from New York Republicans to New Jersey's Democratic governors to teachers' unions. And now the Trump administration has joined the chorus.
Last month, the Department of Transport moved to block the program by withdrawing federal approval of the traffic plan, and the Metropolitan Department of Transportation responded promptly filed a lawsuit. The fate of the program is uncertain.
Opponents of the crowd price say the tolls are too steep and therefore unfair to the working class and poor residents. However, the opposition has struggled to provide concrete alternatives to invest in public transport.
The reality is that public transport in many American cities is terrible and requires a lot of money. And the best solution to those transport struggles is not to make driving more affordable. The goal is to make public transport accessible to everyone.
Poor people need better public transport
Driving is not cheap. Auto prices, insurance premiums and lease options are often expensive and out of reach for many. Maintenance and necessary repairs can also bring people backwards. That's why low-income people are less likely to have a car. (For example, in 2022, 30% of low-income households did not own or lease a car. For households above $245,000, that figure was just 3%.)
But there's a problem. Wealthy residents have many options, including cars, taxis, buses, and trains, but despite the fact that low-income commuters are heavily dependent on public transport, they often have fewer public transport in poor areas.
All this leads to longer commute times for low-wage workers and burdens transportation costs. Transportation Bureau statistics show that low-income households spend up to 30% of their post-tax income on transportation, while the average household spends around 15%.
So, while opposition to congestion pricing may seem to be related to the costs of low-income commuters, the truth is that improving public transport access while making it affordable is more likely to benefit working-class families than removing tolls from the road.
America needs to double public transport
Transport inequality has concrete consequences for people's lives. Some people lack important life events, such as job interviews and doctor appointments due to rising fares, frequent delays and traffic congestion.
But there's no need to do this. And, by chance, investment in public transport can create a positive cycle. The better services provided by cities, the more likely people will be to abandon their cars for trains and buses, improve traffic and increase fare revenue for transportation hardships. As I wrote last year, public transport in Washington, DC is the perfect example of this. The Washington Metropolitan Transportation Agency has spent its boosting with cash received from federal pandemic aid on improving services and reducing fares. As a result, more riders have returned than many other cities.
More cities need to adopt that approach. Add new transit routes and create bus lanes to guide people faster and maintain affordable prices. The problem is that there is often not enough political will to raise taxes or allocate taxpayer dollars to further subsidize public transport. That's why crowds in New York City are a big deal. It is the country's first experiment to redistribute money from drivers to transport, and hopefully it could disproportionately benefit low-income residents. And if it succeeds in New York, other cities may follow suit.
Lawmakers may dislike double the number on public transport as they tend to prioritize buses on cars or repel train tracks on roads loudly from drivers. However, as New York's busy pricing model has shown so far, good transport policies are becoming increasingly popular over time. Most New Yorkers opposed crowd pricing before it came into effect, but 60% want to maintain tolls.
So, cities, large and small, should double and become creative in ways that boost public transport revenue. Low-income commuters who stand to benefit most long-term transportation investments deserve less.
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